Manila Priory

More than hundred years ago, five young, adventurous women left their monastery in Tutzing, Germany. They sailed to the far east – to a strange land they had never seen nor heard. They sailed in mid-August 1906 and arrived in Manila, on September 14, feast of the Exaltation of the Cross.

The Prioress General of Tutzing Mother Birgitta Korff, OSB had received an urgent appeal from the Apostolic Nuncio to the Philippines, Dom Ambrosius Agius, OSB to please send some of her Sisters to the Philippines, soon! “Hundreds of thousands of children grow up without any instruction, “he wrote,” and thousands upon thousands must die without the sacraments”.

Within three months – December 3, 1906 – the sisters established a small school with 6 girls and 2 boys, who could afford to pay some fees. With the small amount of money they earned, they started a free school with 50 boys and girls from the neighborhood. The school was later called St. Scholastica’s College. The Missionary Benedictine pioneers had just one purpose: to spread faith in Jesus Christ.